Baghdad is in the lead .. 3.5 million Iraqis live in slums, and they constitute 12% of the population

Spokesman for the Ministry of Planning, Abdul Zahra Al-Hindawi, «Economy News»
 
02/16/2021

Economy News - Baghdad

The Ministry of Planning announced a new statistic regarding the number of Iraqis who live in the slums, indicating that Karbala Governorate came at the bottom of the list of cities in terms of the number of slums.

The ministry’s spokesman, Abdul Zahra al-Hindawi, said in an interview on state television, which was seen by “Al-Iqtisad News,” that the Ministry of Planning conducted a special survey of informal settlements in Iraq in 2017, but it did not include all Iraqi governorates due to the general conditions of the country at that time.

He added, "The survey showed that the number of slums in Iraq is close to 4000, containing 522,000 housing units," but they do not resemble natural housing units, as he put it.

Al-Hindawi said that in these slums live "approximately 3.5 million people, who make up 12% of the Iraqi population."

He pointed out that "Baghdad ranks first with 1,022 random slums, followed by Basra governorate with 700 slums, then Nineveh Governorate, while Karbala governorate ranked last as the least governorate in terms of the number of slums, at 98 random."

He pointed out that "76% of the informal settlements were built on state-owned land, and the rest of the slums were built on lands belonging to the private sector."

The ministry asserted, "towards the implementation of a broad survey, which we called the Economic and Social Survey of Informal Settlements, but this survey is linked to the law, as we want a law cover for every activity we perform within the roadmap prepared by the Ministry of Planning since 2016."

He indicated that "the road map prepared by the ministry was in cooperation with the United Nations Program for Human Settlements. It contains multiple paths and is implemented in two phases. The first stage is to limit the spread of informal settlements, and the second stage is to address these informal settlements."

He confirmed the ministry's intention, "to issue a law for dealing with informal settlements, which includes establishing a fund to which the revenues of slums sold to citizens will go."

The ministry spokesman added, "The Ministry of Planning sent a bill to deal with slums to the House of Representatives in its previous session, but it was not read. The parliament proposed another law, but it exacerbated the problem of slums and did not solve it." 

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